Japan's top gangster at risk of Al Capone-style fall: experts

A recent split in Japan's biggest
yakuza crime syndicate may have put its top leader at serious risk of tax
evasion charges like those that toppled Chicago mobster Al Capone, experts said
Tuesday.

Police have warned of a possible
gang bloodbath after a breakaway group broke off from the Yamaguchi-gumi
earlier this year.

And the rival faction may have
got its hands on sensitive information about illicit funds passed to gang
leader Kenichi Shinoda, who is also known as Shinobu Tsukasa, experts said.

"Those that split off are
believed to have data about how much Tsukasa has pocketed" over the years,
freelance journalist and yakuza expert Atsushi Mizoguchi told the Foreign
Correspondents' Club of Japan.

The rival gang could try to use
that information to bring down their former boss by supplying it to police, he
added.

"As far as there are memos
showing when and how much cash was passed to him, the tax evasion charge would
stand," Mizoguchi said.

Authorities have been cracking
down on the long-tolerated yakuza, whose heavily tattooed members are infamous
for lopping off their own fingers for even minor transgressions.

Like the Italian Mafia and
Chinese triads, the yakuza engage in everything from gambling, drugs and
prostitution to loan sharking, protection rackets and white-collar crime.

A feeble economy and steadily
falling membership hurt the bottom line, while less organised rivals muscled in
on yakuza territory.

Before the Yamaguchi-gumi's
high-profile split, losing more than 10 percent of its soldiers, the group led
by Tsukasa boasted more than 23,000 members and was Japan's biggest single
gangster group.

But the breakaway mobsters became
angry at the millions of dollars which they had to hand over to top brass
annually including Tsukasa, who is known for donning expensive Italian suits,
Mizoguchi said.

The head of a rival yakuza group
was recently arrested on tax evasion charges based on memos showing cash
transfers, he added.

"Taxation is a very
effective way to control the mafia, and it's used worldwide," lawyer
Hideaki Kubori, an expert on Japan's anti-gang law, told the correspondents'
club.